TY - JOUR TI - Occurrence of anti-cancer drugs in the aquatic environment and efficiency of their removal ‒ the selected issues AU - Balcerzak, Wojciech AU - Rezka, Piotr TI - Occurrence of anti-cancer drugs in the aquatic environment and efficiency of their removal ‒ the selected issues AB - The article discusses the occurrence of selected cytostatic drugs in the aquatic environment. The authors start with a preliminary introduction to the characteristics of the most commonly used cytostatic drugs. Then, based on the review of the literature they show that such drugs occur in small amounts in an aqueous medium and that there is no reliable research data on the long-term exposure of aquatic organisms to cytostatics. Until now, the studies on the stability of some cytostatics showed that these compounds were extremely stable, not only in natural waters, but also at wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). In spite of the advanced treatment technologies used at wastewater treatment plants, cytostatics pass relatively easily through the treatment line and end up in surface waters, thus posing a threat to water quality. VL - 2014 IS - Środowisko Zeszyt 1-Ś (20) 2014 PY - 2015 SN - 0011-4561 C1 - 2353-737X SP - 11 EP - 18 DO - 10.4467/2353737XCT.14.322.3410 UR - https://ejournals.eu/czasopismo/czasopismo-techniczne/artykul/occurrence-of-anti-cancer-drugs-in-the-aquatic-environment-and-efficiency-of-their-removal-the-selected-issues KW - cytostatic drugs KW - cyclophosphamide KW - ifosfamide KW - 5-fluorouracil KW - wastewater KW - surface water